Does Roon sound better?

Roon doesn’t sound any different. It’s playing the same digital data. 

I found that Linn Kinsky with Minimserver and BubbleUPnP (all freeware) beat Roon for SQ.  I have heard that Roon is better when used with HQplayer but I have not tried this.

I posted over on the Auralic forums what people thought about Roon versus Lightning DS. For the most part folks said soundwise they were equivalent or Lightning DS sounded better. Roon was deemed better for organization and particularly integrating a home music library and Tidal. You can read that thread here:

https://community.auralic.com/t/roon-vs-lightning-ds/936

If you prefer the organization then it’s a grest deal, but to be clear it should sound exactly the same on a device that offers both Room and Tidal directly. It’s processing the same bits in the same way. Once you start adding other hardware and paths then sure, but in this instance I can’t imagine how it would sound any different. 

@mayoradamwest Try a Raspberry Pi with Digione board.  It will play both Roon/Tidal and Linn Kinsky with DLNA.  Linn Kinsky is better.  You can easily do an A/B.